Becta seeks rival 'office' software

Schools and colleges could soon be stepping up use of "open source" software (software downloadable for free from the internet), thanks to the awarding of the first tender by Becta for office suite software which offers an alternative to existing products. The government's educational technology agency announced last Thursday that the Alphaplus Consultancy of Manchester has been awarded the winning bid to develop a "research project" that could eventually lead to an "open source" office suite to rival that of Microsoft.

Becta recently invited companies to submit tenders for a research project to support its recommendation to "provide schools specific content development on open source implementations", while supporting "the sustainable and significant community of schools who use and develop open source products by April 2010". The project will be funded initially for two years wih a review after 18 months.

A statement from Becta reads: "Schools will benefit from the research results as they will be able to share best practice, benefit from cost savings and gather a wider experience of non-proprietary software to make informed choices as to what type of technology is best."

The news follows a long-running tussle between Becta and Microsoft. In October 2007, Becta complained to the UK competition regulator - the Office of Fair Trading (OFT) - alleging anti-competitive licensing practices by Microsoft in the schools software marketplace.

After discussions with the OFT, Becta then referred its interoperability complaint and related evidence to the European Commission to support its formal investigation in relation to Microsoft's approach to interoperability across a number of areas. At a recent meeting with the Commission, Becta set out its key areas of concern and their impact on the UK education system.